Ancient pyramid of Cheops. Pyramid of Cheops - inside there are two more pyramids

Everything that arises must have some reason for its occurrence, for it is absolutely impossible to arise without a reason. " (IV century BC, Plato, Timaeus).

And so, let's start with the facts.
First, there are three burial chambers in the pyramid. - Three! It never occurs to any living person to prepare his own tomb in triplicate. In addition, as can be seen from the size of the pyramids, it was a very troublesome and time-consuming business. Egyptian archaeologists have established that the pharaohs built separate pyramids of a much smaller size for their wives, and the "family" in the burials of the pharaohs has not been established. From this it follows that the pyramid at different times had three owners (three pharaohs) and therefore each in the pyramid had its own burial chamber.

To confirm this conclusion, consider the pyramid in section (what it is).

Egyptian historians have established that long before the construction of the pyramids in ancient Egypt in the 4th millennium BC. and even earlier, the pharaohs were buried in deep underground halls - "mastabah", where the mummy was located. In the ground part, on the top above the hall, a not high, flat truncated pyramid was erected, in the inner room of which there was a prayer room with a statue, into which after death (by faith) the pharaoh's soul moved. The halls of the premises could be isolated from each other.

Looking at the plan of the section, we can say that the upper prayer room of the first mastaba (not more than 15 meters high), which has not yet been discovered, is located in the center of the pyramid, just below the middle burial chamber (7). If, of course, by the time the second pharaoh was building his own pyramid over the mastaba, the latter was not destroyed (plundered) or crushed, and survived.

A narrow inclined vertical shaft (12) for lifting the soul from the underground burial pit (5) should rise to the above-ground prayer room of the mastaba. At the exit of the mine to the level of the surface of the plateau under the base of the pyramid there is a small grotto (expanding up to 5 meters), the walls of which are partially reinforced with more ancient masonry that does not belong to the pyramid. This ancient masonry is nothing more than the belonging of the first mastaba. From the grotto (12) to the center of the pyramid there should be a continuation into the mastaba, which was closed or was later blocked.

According to archaeologists, the underground burial "pit" (5) for some reason remained unfinished. Perhaps for the same reason, the upper above-ground part of the mastaba with the prayer room was not completed (the latter remains to be clarified). The incompleteness of the burial structure, located in the most advantageous place, on the top of the stone plateau, served (to the Pharaoh preceding Cheops) as a pretext and moral basis for taking mastaba as a basis for building his own pyramid over it.

In favor of the fact that the plateau in Gizi was previously "inhabited" by ancient mastabs, the fact that the age of the "Sphinx" is estimated to be much older than the pyramids (about 5-10 thousand years) also speaks.

By the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC. in Egypt burials in mastabas were replaced by more majestic structures - pyramids. Appeared among the Egyptians and another later worldview about the place of residence of the soul after death. - "The one who will live the time, meted out properly, will return to the abode of the star with the same name." (Plato, Timaeus).

The burial chamber (7) belonging to the second inner pyramid (according to the plan of the cross section) is presumably located above the prayer part of the first mastaba. The corridor (6) ascending to the chamber is laid along the wall, and the horizontal corridor (8) along the roof of the mastaba. Thus, one can "see" the approximate boundaries of the first ancient internal truncated mastaba pyramid.

The second inner pyramid is ten meters on each side less than the current outer third pyramid of Cheops. This can be judged by the length of two outgoing from the chamber (7), the so-called - ventilation ducts (in section 20 by 25 cm), which, approximately (according to the drawing of the pyramid) about ten meters do not reach the plane of the current outer walls. Of course, these are not ventilation ducts that the deceased pharaoh did not need. This is a path directed to the sky, oriented with great accuracy (up to a degree) to those stars where, according to the ideas of the ancient Egyptians, the soul of the pharaoh will settle after death. When the second pyramid was being built, the channels from the burial room (7) reached the edges of the outer walls and were open to the sky.

The Sphinx is a lion (symbol of royal power) with a human head and the face of a pharaoh. It is assumed that the face of the pharaoh (after plastic restoration of the mummy's skull) will be similar to the face of the Sphinx. The veil over the secret of the pyramids of Cheops and the Sphinx has been lifted, now it is necessary to “enter”.

The pyramid is part of the ritual and burial complex of the earthly ruler: the pharaoh. Therefore, with all the differences, in addition to the general shape, all pyramids also have a common internal structure, which is due to the obligatory presence of a hall in which the pharaoh's sarcophagus and the passages leading to it were installed. Let's see how they are arranged Egyptian pyramids inside on the example of the tomb of Cheops - the tallest stone structure in the world.

The only entrance, which was provided by the ancient builders, is on the northern side of the pyramidal structure at a height of 12 meters from the ground. Once upon a time, this entrance was hidden by slabs of cladding, but already at the end of the 18th century, the first European scientists who studied this wonder of the world - the French - saw it open, since by that time people and time had deprived ancient structure facing slabs.

Inside the Cheops pyramid there is a passage-corridor having an almost square cross-section. The angle of inclination of the corridor, apparently, was not chosen arbitrarily - it coincides with the angle at which the ancient Egyptians could observe the North Star. Therefore, the first researchers had to face certain difficulties - then there was no railings, which are now made for the convenience of tourists, and their feet slid over the stone polished slabs of the floor. And ventilation was incomparably worse then than today (although even now it is far from ideal). The corridor sometimes narrowed to such an extent that you had to crawl on your haunches. Now, again for the sake of tourists, everything is "tweaked".

Pyramid of Cheops inside

Unlike most other similar structures in Egypt, which have one burial chamber, the most famous pyramidal colossus has three of them. One of them - underground - is located below the base of the structure, carved directly into the natural foundation. However, this chamber was not completely finished. Apparently, the plans of the builders have changed, and the other two chambers are already located directly in the above-ground stone body of a giant structure. For a long time, scientists explained this by the fact that the pharaoh wanted the tomb to be ready for a possible burial ceremony at any stage of construction. And when the builders began construction of the next chamber, located above, the need for an underground chamber disappeared.

This theory does not explain why all other similar structures have a burial chamber below the baseline. Only the pyramids of the pharaohs Sneferu and Cheops have burial chambers inside above the base in the thickness of the stonework. A significant number of modern Egyptologists believe that such an arrangement of chambers in the tomb of Cheops was associated with certain religious views of the ancient inhabitants of Egypt. In short, this theory is as follows. There are facts that allow us to conclude that Cheops began to be worshiped as the god Ra during his lifetime.

The pyramid of this pharaoh is called the "Horizon of Khufu", which meant that he, like the god Ra himself, ascends every day to the horizon. The sons and successors of Cheops - Djedefra and Chefren became the first pharaohs whose titles contain the epithet - "son of Ra". That is, Khufu was identified with Ra, therefore his burial chamber should be located above the earth and closer to the sky - where the real sun is visible. True, it should be noted that in relation to Pharaoh Sneferu, no facts have yet been found that would allow interpreting the location of his burial chamber in this way.

But let's return again to what constitutes pyramid of Cheops inside... From the corridor leading down to the underground chamber, approximately at ground level, a passage leading upward begins. From it you can get into a small gallery, and then into a small chamber called the Queen's Chamber. One of the underground "interchanges" If you do not turn in the direction of the queen's room, but go further, then the Great Gallery will begin, having a length of 47 and a height of 8.5 meters. This magnificent gallery presents a unique architectural structure... The ancient craftsmen laid the limestone slabs of the false vault in this way, so that each subsequent layer overlaps the previous one by 5-6 cm. The limestone slabs framing the walls are polished to a shine and are pressed together with amazing precision - even the blade of a thin knife would not have passed at the joints ... The floor has notches that allow you to move around without having to hold onto smooth walls.

After the Great Gallery, there is a small gateway room leading to a room called the King's Chamber. Its dimensions are as follows:

• length - 10.5 m;
• width - 5.2 m;
• height - 5.8 meters.

Chamber lining is made of slabs pink granite... Five unloading chambers have been erected above the ceiling, the upper of which has a gable roof made of giant granite blocks. They take upon themselves the enormous weight of the stone mass, not allowing it to crush the burial chamber of the pharaoh. It should also be noted that the pharaoh's camera is accurately oriented to the cardinal points.

At the western wall (the Egyptians' afterlife began in the west) is a massive sarcophagus, carved from a monolithic block of pink granite. The sarcophagus has no lid. Also, no trace of the pharaoh's mummy was found. That is, there is no evidence that the Cheops pyramid was ever used for an actual burial. However, no other burial place of Pharaoh Cheops has yet been discovered, just as his mummy has not been found either. Nevertheless, Egyptologists have sufficient grounds to say that the pyramids are part of a ritual-burial complex, and not something else.

When the first European explorers discovered the pharaoh's sarcophagus at the end of the 18th century, they still did not know exactly for whom this, as they thought, tomb was erected, as the name of the ancient ruler of Egypt was. It was only later that several hieroglyphs were found above the burial chamber, surrounded by an oval frame. For the sake of fairness, it should be noted that some of the Egyptologists consider this inscription to be a much later forgery, and there are certain grounds for this. The inscription could be read thanks to the scientific discoveries of Champollion, who by that time had already deciphered the language of the ancient Egyptians. It turned out that this was the name of the pharaoh, by whose order this main and first wonder of the world was built. Pharaoh's name was Khufu (the Greeks called him Cheops), and he ruled according to modern scientific concepts in the XXVIII-XXVII centuries. BC, that is, about 4700 years ago.

The mystery of the mysterious channels

Speaking about the structure of the Cheops pyramid, one cannot but say that both the queen's chamber and the king's chamber are equipped with inclined shafts-channels of a square cross-section with an average size of 20x20 cm going up in the north and south directions. Until recently, it was believed that they served as ventilation ducts. However, if two passages extending from the burial chamber of the pharaoh pass through the body of the structure and go outside, then two passages from the queen's chamber cannot be ventilation ducts - they end in the masonry itself far from the outer surfaces of the walls (see diagram above).

Since 1993, attempts have been made using various technical devices to understand for what purpose they were intended. German engineers have designed a special robot capable of crawling through such narrow mines. But both in the southern mine and in the northern one, the robot buried itself in an obstacle, which is a kind of plate with two protrusions (handles?), Similar to metal (copper?). An attempt was made to drill one of the partitions, but the video camera, which the robot pushed into the drilled hole, showed that a small space behind the slab again ends with a new stone partition.

It was decided to continue the research, preparing new technical equipment, but the events in Egypt, which took place in early 2011, postponed them indefinitely.

In the light of new data, a scientific hypothesis has spread that these mines performed certain ritual tasks associated with the religious beliefs of the ancients. There is also a simpler hypothesis that initially these were actually ventilation ducts. But as the structure rose higher and higher, it was decided to build a third burial chamber - the king's chamber. And the builders blocked the passages leading from the queen's chamber as unnecessary. This hypothesis is indirectly confirmed by the fact that the entrances to the mines from the side of the queen's chamber were walled up and were found only after her careful examination.

The internal structure of the Cheops pyramid from an engineering and construction point of view, it is the most difficult of all such structures in Ancient Egypt. All other Egyptian pyramids inside look about the same as the great pyramidal structure of Cheops, but in general, inside the pyramids of other pharaohs have a simpler structure, with the exception of the tomb of Pharaoh Djoser in Sakkara, which has an extensive system of underground passages and rooms at its base.

It will also be interesting to see.

The history of the construction of the Cheops pyramid

The beginning of the construction of the pyramid dates back to about 2560 BC. The architect was Khemion, the nephew of Pharaoh Cheops, who managed all the construction projects of the Old Kingdom at that time. It took at least 20 years to build the Cheops pyramid, while, according to various estimates, more than one hundred thousand people were involved. The project required a titanic effort: workers mined blocks for construction elsewhere, in the rocks, delivered them along the river and lifted them along an inclined plane to the top of the pyramid on wooden skids. For the construction of the Cheops pyramid, more than 2.5 million granite and limestone blocks were needed, and a gilded stone was installed at the very top, which gave the entire cladding the color of the sun's rays. But in the 2nd century, when the Arabs destroyed Cairo, the locals dismantled the entire facing of the pyramid to build their houses.

For almost three millennia, the Cheops pyramid ranked first on Earth in height, giving the palm only in 1300 to Lincoln Cathedral. Now the height of the pyramid is 138 m, it has decreased in comparison with the original by 8 m, and the base area is more than 5 hectares.

The pyramid of Cheops is revered local residents as a shrine, and every year on August 23 the Egyptians celebrate the day of the beginning of its construction. Why August was chosen, no one knows, because no historical facts no evidence of this has been found.

The device of the Cheops pyramid

Inside the pyramid of Cheops, the most interesting are three burial chambers, which are located one above the other in a strict vertical. The lowest one remained unfinished, the second belongs to the wife of the pharaoh, and the third belongs to Cheops himself.

To travel along the corridors, for the convenience of tourists, paths with steps were laid, railings were made and lighting was carried out.

Cross section of the Cheops pyramid

1. Main entrance
2. The entrance that al-Mamun made
3. Crossroads, "traffic jam" and al-Mamun's tunnel made "bypassing"
4. Descending corridor
5. Unfinished underground chamber
6. Ascending corridor

7. "Queen's Chamber" with outgoing "air ducts"
8. Horizontal tunnel

10. Pharaoh's chamber with "air ducts"
11. Antechamber
12. Mainsail

The entrance to the pyramid

The entrance to the Cheops pyramid is an arch formed of stone slabs and is located on the north side, at a height of 15 m 63 cm. Previously, it was filled with a granite plug, but it has not survived to this day. In 820, Caliph Abdullah al-Mamun decided to find treasures in the pyramid and made a seventeen-meter gap 10 meters below the historic entrance. The Baghdad ruler did not find anything, but today tourists enter the pyramid through this tunnel.

When al-Mamun was making his way, a lump of limestone that fell out blocked the entrance to another ascending corridor, and three more granite plugs remained behind the limestone. Since a vertical tunnel was found at the junction of two corridors, descending and ascending, it was suggested that granite plugs were lowered down through it in order to seal the tomb after the burial of the Egyptian king.

Burial "pit"

The descending corridor, which is 105 meters long, descends into the ground at an inclination of 26 ° 26'46 and abuts against another 8.9 m long corridor leading to chamber 5 and located horizontally. Here is an unfinished chamber measuring 14 × 8.1 m, stretching from east to west in shape. For a long time it was believed that there were no other rooms in the pyramid, except for this corridor and the chamber, but it turned out differently. The height of the chamber reaches 3.5 m. At the southern wall of the chamber there is a well with a depth of about 3 m, from which a narrow manhole (0.7 × 0.7 m in cross section) stretches southward for 16 m, ending in a dead end.

Engineers John Shae Perring and Howard Wyse (Richard William Howard Vyse) in the early 19th century tore apart the cell's floor and dug a well 11.6 meters deep, in which they hoped to find a hidden burial room. They were based on the testimony of Herodotus, who asserted that the body of Cheops was on an island surrounded by a channel in a hidden underground chamber. Their excavations have led nowhere. Later studies showed that the chamber was abandoned unfinished, and it was decided to arrange the burial chambers in the center of the pyramid itself.

The interior of the burial pit, photo from 1910

The Ascending Corridor and the Queen's Chambers

From the first third of the descending passage (after 18 m from the main entrance) upwards at the same angle of 26.5 °, an ascending passage (6) about 40 m long goes to the south, ending in the lower part of the Great Gallery (9).

At its beginning, the ascending passage contains 3 large cubic granite "plugs", which from the outside, from the descending passage, were masked by a block of limestone that fell out during the works of al-Mamun. It turned out that for almost 3 thousand years, scientists were sure that there were no other rooms in the Great Pyramid, except for the descending passage and the underground chamber. Al-Mamun failed to break through these plugs, and he simply carved a bypass in the softer limestone to the right of them.

In the middle of the ascending passage, the structure of the walls has a peculiarity: three locations the so-called "frame stones" have been installed - that is, the passage, square along its entire length, pierces through three monoliths. The purpose of these stones is unknown.

A horizontal corridor 35 m long and 1.75 m high leads to the second burial chamber from the lower part of the Great Gallery in a southern direction. It is traditionally called the "Queen's Chamber", although according to the rite of the wives of the pharaohs, they were buried in separate small pyramids. The “Queen's Chamber”, faced with limestone, measures 5.74 meters from east to west and 5.23 meters from north to south; her maximum height 6.22 meters. There is a high niche in the east wall of the cell.

Grotto, Great Gallery and Pharaoh's Chambers

Another offshoot from the lower part of the Great Gallery is a narrow, almost vertical shaft, about 60 m high, leading to the lower part of the descending passage. There is an assumption that it was intended for the evacuation of workers or priests who were completing the "sealing" of the main passage to the "King's Chamber". Approximately in the middle of it there is a small, most likely natural extension - "Grotto" of irregular shape, in which several people could fit at most. The grotto (12) is located at the "junction" of the pyramid's stonework and a small, about 9 meters high, hill on a limestone plateau, lying at the base of the Great Pyramid. The walls of the Grotto are partially fortified with ancient stonework, and since some of its stones are too large, there is an assumption that the Grotto existed on the Giza plateau as an independent structure long before the construction of the pyramids, and the evacuation shaft itself was built taking into account the location of the Grotto. However, given the fact that the mine was hollowed out in the already laid masonry, and not laid out, as evidenced by its irregular circular cross-section, the question arises of how the builders managed to get to the Grotto.

The Great Gallery continues the ascending passage. Its height is 8.53 m, it is rectangular in cross-section, with slightly tapering upward ("false vault") walls, a high inclined tunnel 46.6 m long. In the middle of the Great Gallery almost along its entire length, there is a square depression 1 meter wide in section and a depth of 60 cm, and on both side protrusions there are 27 pairs of indentations of unknown purpose. The deepening ends with a "Big Step" - a high horizontal ledge, a platform 1x2 meters, at the end of the Big Gallery, directly in front of the access to the "hallway" - the Predicamera. The site has a pair of similar to the ramp depressions, depressions in the corners of the wall. Through the "hallway" the manhole leads to the burial "Tsar's Chamber" faced with black granite, where an empty granite sarcophagus is located.

Above the "Tsar's Chamber" are found in the XIX century. five discharge chambers total height 17 m, between which there are monolithic slabs about 2 m thick, and above there is a gable floor. Their purpose is to distribute the weight of the overlying layers of the pyramid (about a million tons) in order to protect the "King's Chamber" from pressure. In these voids, graffiti was found, probably left by workers.

A network of ventilation ducts leads from the chambers to the north and south. The channels from the Queen's Chamber do not reach the surface of the pyramid by 12 meters, and the channels from the Pharaoh's Chamber come out to the surface. No other pyramid has such branches found. Scientists have not come to a unanimous opinion whether they were built for ventilation or related to the Egyptians' ideas about the afterlife. There are doors at the upper ends of the channels, most likely, symbolizing the entrance to another world. In addition, the channels indicate the stars: Sirius, Tuban, Alnitak, which makes it possible to assume that the Cheops pyramid had an astronomical purpose.

Surrounding the pyramid of Cheops

At the eastern edge of the Cheops pyramid there are 3 small pyramids of his wives and family members. They are located from north to south, according to size: the side of the base of each building is 0.5 meters smaller than the previous one. They are well preserved inside; time only partially destroyed the outer cladding. Nearby, you can see the foundation of the funeral temple of Khufu, inside which drawings were found depicting a ritual performed by the pharaoh, it was called the Unification of the Two Lands.

Pharaoh's boats

The Pyramid of Cheops is the central figure of the complex of buildings, the location of which had ritual significance. The procession with the deceased Pharaoh crossed the Nile to the western bank on numerous boats. The first part of the funeral ceremony began in the lower church, to which the boats were sailing. Further, the procession went to the upper temple, where the prayer house and the altar were located. To the west of the upper temple was the pyramid itself.

On each side of the pyramid, in rocky recesses, boats were walled up, on which the pharaoh was supposed to travel through the afterlife.

In 1954, archaeologist Zaki Nur discovered the first boat, called the Solar Boat. It was made of Lebanese cedar, consisted of 1224 pieces, without any traces of attachment and connection. Its dimensions: length 43 m and width 5.5 m. It took 16 years to restore the boat.

On the southern side of the Cheops pyramid, a museum of this boat is open.

The second boat was found in a mine located to the east of the place where the first boat was found. A camera was lowered into the shaft, which showed traces of insects on the boat, so it was decided not to raise it and seal the shaft. This decision was made by the scientist Yoshimuro from Waseda University.

In total, seven pits were discovered with real ancient Egyptian boats taken apart.

Video: 5 unsolved secrets of the pyramids of Egypt

How to get there

If you want to see the Great Pyramid of Cheops, you need to arrive in Cairo. But there are practically no direct flights from Russia and you will have to make a transfer in Europe. Without a change, you can fly to Sharm el-Sheikh, and from there fly 500 kilometers to Cairo. You can get to your destination by a comfortable bus, the travel time is about 6 hours, or you can continue by plane, they fly to Cairo every half hour. In Egypt, they are very loyal to Russian tourists; a visa can be obtained directly at the airport after landing. It will cost $ 25 and is issued for a month.

Where to stay

If your goal is the treasures of antiquity and you have come to the pyramids, then you can choose a hotel in Giza and in the center of Cairo. There are almost two hundred comfortable hotels with all the benefits of civilization. In addition, there are many attractions in Cairo, it is a city of contrasts: modern skyscrapers and ancient minarets, noisy colorful bazaars and nightclubs, neon nights and quiet palm gardens.

Instruction for tourists

Don't forget that Egypt is a Muslim state. Men should simply not notice Egyptians, because even an innocent touch can be regarded as harassment. Women must follow the rules of dress. Modesty and again modesty, a minimum of exposed areas of the body.

Tickets for organized excursions to the pyramids can be purchased at any hotel.

The pyramids zone is open to the public in the summer from 8 am to 5 pm, in the winter it is open for half an hour less, the cost of the entrance ticket is about 8 euros.

Museums are paid separately: you can see the Solar Boats for 5 euros.

For the entrance to the Cheops pyramid, you will be charged 13 euros, inspection of the Khafre pyramid will cost less - 2.6 euros. There is a very low passage here and be prepared for the fact that you will have to walk 100 meters in a bent position.

Other pyramids, such as those of Khafre's wife and mother, can be viewed free of charge by showing an entrance ticket to the area.

The best time to view them is in the morning, right after opening. It is strictly forbidden to climb the pyramids, cut off a piece of memory and write "There was ...". You can pay a fine for this that it will exceed the cost of your trip.

If you want to capture yourself against the background of the pyramids or just the surroundings, prepare 1 euro for the right to shoot, photography is prohibited inside the pyramids. If you are offered to photograph you, do not agree and do not give the camera to anyone, otherwise you will have to buy it back.

Tickets for visiting the pyramids are limited: 150 pieces are sold at 8 am and the same number at 1 pm. There are two cash desks: one at the main entrance, the other at the Sphinx.

Each of the pyramids is closed once a year for restoration work, so you are unlikely to see everything at once.

If you don't feel like walking around the entire Giza area, you can rent a camel. Its cost will depend on your bargaining ability. But keep in mind that you will not be told all the prices at once, and when you roll, it turns out that you have to pay to get off the camel.

Delicate tip: The toilet is located in the Solar Boat Museum.

On the territory of the pyramids zone there are cafeterias where you can have a good lunch.

There is a one-hour light and sound show every evening in the evenings. It is held in different languages: Arabic, English, Japanese, Spanish, French. On Sundays, the show is held in Russian. It is recommended to split the visit to the pyramids and the visit to the show for two days, otherwise you will not be able to accommodate so many impressions.

, vizier and nephew of Cheops. He also bore the title "Manager of all Pharaoh's construction sites." For more than three thousand years (before the construction of the Cathedral in Lincoln, England, around 1300), the pyramid was the tallest building on Earth.

It is estimated that construction, which lasted twenty years, ended around 2540 BC. NS. The existing methods of dating the time of the beginning of the construction of the pyramid are divided into historical, astronomical and radiocarbon dating. In Egypt, the date for the start of the construction of the pyramid of Cheops is officially established and celebrated - August 23, 2560 BC. NS. This date was obtained using the astronomical method of Keith Spence (University of Cambridge). However, this date should not be considered a true historical event, since its method and the dates obtained with its help were criticized by many Egyptologists. The existing three other dating methods give different dates - Stephen Hack (University of Nebraska) 2720 BC. BC, Juana Antonio Belmonte (University of Astrophysics at Canaris) 2577 BC NS. and Pollux (Bauman University) 2708 BC. NS. The radiocarbon method gives a range from 2680 BC. NS. to 2850 BC NS. Therefore, the established "birthday" of the pyramid has no serious evidence, since Egyptologists cannot agree on the exact year in which construction began.

Statistical data

• Height (today): ≈ 138.75 m
• Side slope angle (now): 51 ° 50 "
• Side Rib Length (originally): 230.33 m (estimated) or about 440 royal cubits
• Side rib length (now): about 225 m
• The length of the sides of the base of the pyramid: south - 230.454 m; north - 230.253 m; west - 230.357 m; east - 230.394 m
• Base area (initially): ≈ 53,000 m² (5.3 ha)
• Lateral surface area of ​​the pyramid (initially): ≈ 85,500 m²
• Base perimeter: 922 m
• Total volume of the pyramid without deduction of cavities inside the pyramid (initially): ≈ 2.58 million m³
• Total volume of the pyramid minus all known cavities (initially): 2.50 million m³
• Average volume of stone blocks: 1.147 m³
• Average weight of stone blocks: 2.5 t
• The heaviest stone block: about 35 tons - located above the entrance to the "King's Chamber".
• The number of blocks of the average volume does not exceed 1.65 million (2.50 million m³ - 0.6 million m³ of the rock base inside the pyramid = 1.9 million m³ / 1.147 m³ = 1.65 million blocks of the specified volume can physically fit in the pyramid, without accounting for the volume of the solution in the interblock seams); attributing to a 20-year construction period * 300 working days a year * 10 working hours a day * 60 minutes an hour leads to a speed of laying (and delivery to the construction site) - about a block of two minutes.
• According to calculations, the total weight of the pyramid is about 4 million tons (1.65 million blocks x 2.5 tons)
• The base of the pyramid rests on a natural rock eminence with a height of about 12-14 m in the center and occupies, according to the latest data, at least 23% of the original volume of the pyramid

About the pyramid

The pyramid is called “Akhet-Khufu” - “Horizon of Khufu” (or more precisely “Relating to the sky - (this is) Khufu”). Consists of limestone and granite blocks. It was built on a natural limestone hill. After the pyramid has lost several layers of cladding, this hill is partially visible on the east, north and south sides of the pyramid. Despite the fact that the Cheops pyramid is the tallest and most voluminous of all Egyptian pyramids, Pharaoh Sneferu nevertheless built the pyramids in Meidum and Dakhshut (Broken Pyramid and Pink Pyramid), the total mass of which is estimated at 8.4 million tons.

The pyramid was originally faced with a harder white limestone than the main blocks. The top of the pyramid was crowned with a gilded stone - the pyramidion (ancient Egyptian - "Benben"). The facing shone in the sun with a peach color, like "a shining miracle, to which the sun god Ra himself seemed to have given all his rays." In 1168, the Arabs sacked and burned Cairo. The inhabitants of Cairo removed the cladding from the pyramid in order to build new houses.

Pyramid structure

The entrance to the pyramid is at a height of 15.63 meters on the north side. The entrance is formed by stone slabs laid in the form of an arch, but this is a structure that was inside the pyramid - the true entrance has not survived. The true entrance to the pyramid was most likely closed with a stone plug. A description of such a cork can be found in Strabo, and its appearance can also be imagined based on the preserved slab that closed the upper entrance to the Broken Pyramid of Sneferu, the father of Cheops. Today, tourists enter the pyramid through a 17-meter gap, which was made in 820 by the Baghdad caliph Abdullah al-Mamun 10 meters lower. He hoped to find there the untold treasures of the pharaoh, but found there only a layer of dust half a cubit thick.

Inside the Cheops pyramid there are three burial chambers, one above the other.

Burial "pit"

A 105 m long descent corridor at an incline of 26 ° 26'46 leads to a horizontal 8.9 m long corridor leading to the chamber 5 ... Located below ground level in a rocky limestone foundation, it remained unfinished. The chamber is 14 × 8.1 m in size and stretches from east to west. The height reaches 3.5 m, the ceiling has a large crack. At the southern wall of the chamber there is a well about 3 m deep, from which a narrow manhole (0.7 × 0.7 m in section) stretches southward for 16 m, ending in a dead end. Engineers John Shae Perring and Richard William Howard Vyse cleared the floor in the cell in the early 19th century and dug a 11.6 m deep well in which they hoped to find a hidden burial chamber. They were based on the testimony of Herodotus, who asserted that Cheops's body is located on an island surrounded by a channel in a hidden underground chamber. Their excavations have led nowhere. Later research showed that the chamber was left unfinished, and that the burial chambers were arranged in the center of the pyramid itself.

Several photographs taken in 1910

Interior

Interior

Interior

Interior

Interior

Interior

Interior

The Ascending Corridor and the Queen's Chambers

From the first third of the descending passage (after 18 m from the main entrance) upward at the same angle of 26.5 ° goes to the south an ascending passage ( 6 ) about 40 m long, ending at the bottom of the Great Gallery ( 9 ).

At its beginning, the ascending passage contains 3 large cubic granite "plugs", which from the outside, from the descending passage, were masked by a block of limestone that fell out during the works of al-Mamun. Thus, for the previous 3 thousand years, it was believed that there were no other rooms in the Great Pyramid, except for the descending passage and the underground chamber. Al-Mamun did not manage to break through these plugs and he simply gouged a bypass in the softer limestone to the right of them. This passage is still used today. There are two main theories about plugs, one of which is based on the fact that the ascending passage has plugs installed at the beginning of construction and thus this passage was sealed by them from the beginning. The second asserts that the current narrowing of the walls was caused by an earthquake, and the plugs were previously within the Great Gallery and were used to seal the passage only after the funeral of the pharaoh.

An important mystery of this section of the ascending passage is that in the place where the plugs are now located, in the full-sized, albeit shortened, model of the pyramid's passages - the so-called test corridors north of the Great Pyramid - there is a junction of not two, but three corridors at once, the third of which is the vertical tunnel. Since no one has been able to move the traffic jams so far, the question of whether there is a vertical hole above them remains open.

In the middle of the ascending passage, the structure of the walls has a peculiarity: in three places so-called "frame stones" are installed - that is, the passage, square along its entire length, pierces through three monoliths. The purpose of these stones is unknown. In the area of ​​the frame stones, the walls of the passage have several small niches.

A horizontal corridor 35 m long and 1.75 m high leads to the second burial chamber from the lower part of the Great Gallery in a southern direction. The walls of this horizontal corridor are made of very large blocks of limestone, on which false "seams" are applied, imitating the masonry of smaller blocks ... There are sand-filled cavities behind the western wall of the passage. The second chamber is traditionally called the "Queen's Chamber", although according to the rite of the wives of the pharaohs, they were buried in separate small pyramids. The “Queen's Chamber”, faced with limestone, measures 5.74 meters from east to west and 5.23 meters from north to south; its maximum height is 6.22 meters. There is a high niche in the east wall of the cell.

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Drawing of the Queen's Chamber ( 7 )

Niche in the wall of the Queen's Chamber

Corridor at the entrance to the Queen's Hall (1910)

Entrance to the Queen's Chamber (1910)

Niche in the Queen's Chamber (1910)

The ventilation duct in the queen's chamber (1910)

Ascending tunnel corridor ( 12 )

Granite plug (1910)

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Corridor to the ascending tunnel (on the left - covering blocks)

Grotto, Great Gallery and Pharaoh's Chambers

Another offshoot from the lower part of the Great Gallery is a narrow, almost vertical shaft, about 60 m high, leading to the lower part of the descending passage. There is an assumption that it was intended for the evacuation of workers or priests who were completing the "sealing" of the main passage to the "King's Chamber". Approximately in the middle of it there is a small, most likely natural extension - "Grotto" of irregular shape, in which several people could fit at most. Mainsail ( 12 ) is located at the “junction” of the stone masonry of the pyramid and a small, about 9 meters high, hill on a limestone plateau, lying at the base of the Great Pyramid. The walls of the Grotto are partially fortified with ancient stonework, and since some of its stones are too large, there is an assumption that the Grotto existed on the Giza plateau as an independent structure long before the construction of the pyramids, and the evacuation shaft itself was built taking into account the location of the Grotto. However, given the fact that the mine was hollowed out in the already laid masonry, and not laid out, as evidenced by its irregular circular cross-section, the question arises of how the builders managed to get to the Grotto.

The Great Gallery continues the ascending passage. Its height is 8.53 m, it is rectangular in cross-section, with slightly tapering upward (the so-called "false vault") walls, a high inclined tunnel 46.6 m long. In the middle of the Great Gallery, there is a square depression, regular in cross-section, almost along its entire length measuring 1 meter wide and 60 cm deep, and on both side protrusions there are 27 pairs of indentations of unclear purpose. The deepening ends with the so-called. "Big step" - a high horizontal ledge, a platform 1 × 2 meters at the end of the Great Gallery, directly in front of the manhole into the "hallway" - the Antechamber. The site has a pair of depressions similar to the ramp depressions at the corners of the wall (the 28th and last pair of depressions BG). Through the "hallway" the manhole leads to the burial "Tsar's Chamber" faced with black granite, where an empty granite sarcophagus is located. The sarcophagus lid is missing. The ventilation shafts have mouths in the "Tsar's Chamber" on the southern and northern walls at a height of about one meter from the floor level. The mouth of the southern ventshakhta is badly damaged, the northern one appears to be intact. The floor, ceiling, walls of the chamber do not have any decorations or holes or fastening elements of anything related to the time of the construction of the pyramid. The ceiling slabs have all burst along the southern wall and do not fall into the room only due to the pressure of the overlying blocks by the weight.

Above the "Tsar's Chamber" there are five unloading cavities discovered in the 19th century with a total height of 17 m, between which there are monolithic granite slabs about 2 m thick, and above - a gable limestone ceiling. It is believed that their purpose is to distribute the weight of the overlying layers of the pyramid (about a million tons) in order to protect the "King's Chamber" from pressure. In these voids, graffiti was found, probably left by workers.

Interior of the Grotto (1910)

Drawing of the grotto (1910)

Drawing of the connection between the Grotto and the Great Gallery (1910)

Tunnel Entrance (1910)

Tunnel Entrance (1910)

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View of the Great Gallery from the entrance to the premises

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Large gallery

Great Gallery (1910)

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"Big step"

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Pharaoh's Camera Drawing

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Pharaoh's chamber

Pharaoh's Chamber (1910)

The interior of the lobby in front of the Tsar's chamber (1910)

The "ventilation" channel at the southern wall of the king's room (1910)

Ventilation ducts

From the "Tsar's Chamber" and "Tsarina's Chamber" in the northern and southern directions (first horizontally, then obliquely upwards) there are so-called "ventilation" channels 20-25 cm wide. At the same time, the channels of the "Tsar's Chamber", known since the 17th century, through, they are open both from below and from above (on the faces of the pyramid), while the lower ends of the channels of the "Queen's Chamber" are separated from the surface of the wall by about 13 cm, they were discovered by tapping in 1872. The upper ends of these channels do not reach the surface of about 12 meters. The upper ends of the channels of the "Queen's Chamber" are closed with stone "Gantenbrink doors", each with two copper handles. The copper pens were sealed with plaster seals (not preserved, but traces remained). In the southern ventilation mine, the "door" was discovered in 1993 with the help of a remote-controlled robot "Upuaut II"; the bend of the northern shaft did not allow this robot to find the same "door" in it. In 2002, with the help of a new modification of the robot, a hole was drilled in the southern "door", but behind it was a small cavity 18 centimeters long and another stone "door". What lies next is still unknown. This robot confirmed the presence of a similar "door" at the end of the northern channel, but it was not drilled. A new robot in 2010 was able to insert a serpentine camera into a drilled hole in the southern “door” and discovered that the copper “handles” on the other side of the “door” were designed in the form of neat hinges, and individual red ocher badges were applied on the floor of the “ventilation” shaft. Currently, the most common version is that the purpose of the "ventilation" ducts was of a religious nature and is associated with the Egyptians' ideas about the journey of the soul beyond the grave. And the "door" at the end of the canal is nothing more than a door to the afterlife. That is why it does not come out to the surface of the pyramid.

Tilt angle

It is not possible to accurately determine the initial parameters of the pyramid, since its edges and surfaces are currently for the most part dismantled and destroyed. This makes it difficult to calculate the exact tilt angle. In addition, its symmetry itself is not perfect, so there are deviations in the numbers with different measurements.

Geometry research Great pyramid does not give an unambiguous answer to the question of the initial proportions of this structure. It is assumed that the Egyptians had an idea of ​​the "Golden Ratio" and the number pi, which were reflected in the proportions of the pyramid: for example, the ratio of the height to half the perimeter of the base is 14/22 (height = 280 cubits, and the base = 220 cubits, half-perimeter of the base = 2 × 220 cubits; 280/440 = 14/22). For the first time in world history, these values ​​were used in the construction of the pyramid in Meidum. However, for the pyramids of the later eras, these proportions were not used anywhere else, as, for example, some have ratios of height to the base, like 6/5 (Pink pyramid), 4/3 (Khafre's pyramid) or 7/5 (Broken pyramid).

Some of the theories consider the pyramid to be an astronomical observatory. It is argued that the corridors of the pyramid accurately point towards the "polar star" of that time - Tuban, the ventilation corridors of the south side - to the star Sirius, and from the north side - to the star Alnitak.

Concavity of the sides

As in the 18th century, when this phenomenon was discovered, today there is still no satisfactory explanation for this feature of architecture.

Pharaoh's boats

Near the pyramids, seven pits were discovered with real ancient Egyptian boats disassembled to pieces. The first of these ships, called "Solar Boats" or "Solar Boats", was discovered in 1954 by the Egyptian architect Kamal el-Mallah and archaeologist Zaki Nur. The boat was made of cedar and did not have a single trace of nails for fastening the elements. The boat consisted of 1224 parts, they were assembled by the restorer Ahmed Youssef Mustafa only in 1968.

Boat dimensions: length - 43.3 m, width - 5.6 m, and draft - 1.50 m.

On the southern side of the Cheops pyramid, a museum of this boat is open.

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One of the two solar boat pits. Eastern part of the pyramid

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The location where the Solar Boat was discovered

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Boat Museum on the South Side of the Pyramid

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Solar boat Cheops, discovered near the pyramid in 1954.

Pyramids of Queens of Cheops

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Descent to the Henoutsen burial chamber

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Burial chamber Henoutsen

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Literature

• Ionina N.A. 100 great wonders of the world. - Moscow., 1999.
• Voytech Zamarovsky... Their Majesties are pyramids. - Moscow., 1986.

see also

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Ancient kingdom (2686-2181 BC) 1st transition period (2181–2040 BC) Middle kingdom (2040-1650 BC) 2nd transition period (1650-1570 BC) New kingdom (1570-1070 BC)

Pyramids Sculptures

An excerpt characterizing the Pyramid of Cheops

- What are you talking about the militia? He said to Boris.
- They, your lordship, preparing for tomorrow, for death, put on white shirts.
- Ah! .. Wonderful, incomparable people! - said Kutuzov and, closing his eyes, shook his head. - Peerless people! He repeated with a sigh.
- Want to smell gunpowder? He said to Pierre. - Yes, a pleasant smell. I have the honor to adore your wife, is she healthy? My halt at your service. - And, as is often the case with old people, Kutuzov began to look around absentmindedly, as if forgetting everything he needed to say or do.
Obviously, remembering what he was looking for, he beckoned Andrei Sergeich Kaisarov, his adjutant's brother, to him.
- How, how, how is Marina's poetry, how is poetry, how? That on Gerakova he wrote: "You will be a teacher in the building ... Tell me, tell me," said Kutuzov, obviously intending to laugh. Kaisarov read ... Kutuzov, smiling, nodded his head to the beat of the poetry.
When Pierre walked away from Kutuzov, Dolokhov, moving up to him, took his hand.
“I am very glad to meet you here, Count,” he said to him loudly and not embarrassed by the presence of strangers, with particular decisiveness and solemnity. - On the eve of the day on which God knows which of us is destined to stay alive, I am glad to have the opportunity to tell you that I regret the misunderstandings that were between us, and I wish you had nothing against me. I ask you to forgive me.
Pierre, smiling, looked at Dolokhov, not knowing what to say to him. Dolokhov, with tears coming into his eyes, hugged and kissed Pierre.
Boris said something to his general, and Count Bennigsen turned to Pierre and offered to go with him along the line.
“It will be interesting for you,” he said.
“Yes, very interesting,” said Pierre.
Half an hour later, Kutuzov left for Tatarinova, and Bennigsen and his retinue, including Pierre, drove along the line.

From Gorki, Bennigsen went down the high road to the bridge, which the officer from the mound had pointed out to Pierre as the center of the position, and on which there were rows of mown grass that smelled of hay on the bank. They drove across the bridge to the village of Borodino, from there they turned to the left and past a huge number of troops and cannons they drove to a high mound, on which the militiamen were digging the ground. It was a redoubt that did not yet have a name, later called the Raevsky redoubt, or the kurgan battery.
Pierre did not pay much attention to this redoubt. He did not know that this place would be more memorable for him than all the places in the Borodino field. Then they drove across the ravine to Semyonovskoye, in which the soldiers were pulling the last logs of huts and barns. Then downhill and uphill, they drove forward through broken rye knocked out like hail, along the newly laid artillery road along the thrusts of arable land to the flush [a kind of fortification. (Note. Leo Tolstoy.)], Also then still digging.
Bennigsen stopped at the flushes and began to look ahead at the (formerly ours yesterday) Shevardinsky redoubt, on which several horsemen could be seen. The officers said that Napoleon or Murat was there. And everyone looked eagerly at this bunch of horsemen. Pierre also looked there, trying to guess which of these barely visible people was Napoleon. Finally the horsemen left the mound and disappeared.
Bennigsen turned to the general who approached him and began to explain the entire situation of our troops. Pierre listened to Bennigsen's words, straining all his mental powers to understand the essence of the upcoming battle, but with grief felt that his mental abilities were not sufficient for this. He didn't understand anything. Bennigsen stopped speaking, and noticing the figure of Pierre listening, he suddenly said, addressing him:
- You, I think, are not interested?
“Oh, on the contrary, it’s very interesting,” Pierre repeated, not entirely truthfully.
With a flush, they drove even further to the left along a road winding through a dense, low birch forest. In the middle of this
forest, a brown hare with white legs jumped out into the road in front of them and, frightened by the stomp of a large number of horses, was so confused that it jumped along the road in front of them for a long time, arousing general attention and laughter, and only when they shouted at him in several voices did he and disappeared into the thicket. Having traveled two versts through the forest, they drove into a clearing, on which the troops of Tuchkov's corps were stationed, which was supposed to defend the left flank.
Here, on the extreme left flank, Bennigsen talked a lot and fervently and made, as it seemed to Pierre, an important military order. In front of the location of Tuchkov's troops was an elevation. This elevation was not occupied by troops. Bennigsen loudly criticized this mistake, saying that it was insane to leave the commander-in-chief of the hill unoccupied and place troops under it. Some generals expressed the same opinion. One in particular spoke with military fervor that they had been put here for slaughter. Bennigsen ordered in his own name to move the troops to the height.
This order on the left flank made Pierre even more doubtful about his ability to understand military affairs. Listening to Bennigsen and the generals condemning the position of the troops under the mountain, Pierre fully understood them and shared their opinion; but precisely because of this, he could not understand how the one who had placed them here under the mountain could have made such an obvious and gross mistake.
Pierre did not know that these troops were not deployed to defend the position, as Bennigsen thought, but were placed in a hidden place for an ambush, that is, in order to be unnoticed and suddenly strike the advancing enemy. Bennigsen did not know this and moved the troops forward for special reasons, without telling the commander-in-chief about it.

Prince Andrey on this clear August evening on the 25th was lying with his elbows on his arm in a broken shed in the village of Knyazkov, on the edge of the location of his regiment. Through the hole in the broken wall, he looked at a strip of thirty-year-old birches with chopped-off lower branches going along the fence, at the arable land with heaps of oats broken on it and at the bushes, over which the smoke of the fires of soldiers' kitchens could be seen.
No matter how cramped and not needed by anyone, and no matter how hard his life now seemed to Prince Andrey, he, just like seven years ago in Austerlitz on the eve of the battle, felt agitated and irritated.
Orders for tomorrow's battle were given and received by him. There was nothing more for him to do. But his thoughts were the simplest, clearest and therefore terrible thoughts did not leave him alone. He knew that tomorrow's battle should have been the most terrible of all those in which he participated, and the possibility of death for the first time in his life, without any relation to everyday life, without considerations of how it would affect others, but only because attitude towards him, towards his soul, with liveliness, almost certainty, simply and horribly, presented itself to him. And from the height of this performance, everything that previously tormented and occupied him suddenly lit up with a cold white light, without shadows, without perspective, without distinction of outlines. His whole life seemed to him like a magic lantern, into which he looked for a long time through glass and under artificial lighting. Now he suddenly saw, without glass, in the bright daylight, these ill-painted pictures. “Yes, yes, these are those false images that excited and admired and tormented me,” he said to himself, going over in his imagination the main pictures of his magic lantern of life, now looking at them in this cold white light of the day - the clear thought of death. - Here they are, these roughly painted figures, which seemed to be something beautiful and mysterious. Glory, the public good, love for a woman, the fatherland itself - how great these pictures seemed to me, what a deep meaning they seemed to be fulfilled! And all this is so simple, pale and rough in the cold white light of that morning, which, I feel, is rising for me. " The three main griefs of his life in particular held his attention. His love for a woman, the death of his father and the French invasion that captured half of Russia. “Love! .. This girl, who seemed to me full of mysterious powers. How I loved her! I made poetic plans about love, about happiness with her. Oh dear boy! He said aloud angrily. - How! I believed in some kind of ideal love, which should have kept it faithful to me for a whole year of my absence! Like the tender dove of a fable, she should have wither away in separation from me. And all this is much simpler ... All this is terribly simple, disgusting!
My father also built in Bald Hills and thought that this was his place, his land, his air, his peasants; but Napoleon came and, not knowing about his existence, like a chip from the road, knocked him down, and his Bald Mountains and his whole life collapsed. And Princess Marya says that this is a test sent from above. What is the test for when it is no longer and will not be? never again! He's not there! So who is this test? Fatherland, death of Moscow! And tomorrow he will kill me - and not even a Frenchman, but his own, as yesterday a soldier unloaded a gun near my ear, and the French will come, take me by the legs and by the head and throw me into a hole so that I do not stink under their noses, and new conditions will arise. lives that will also be familiar to others, and I will not know about them, and I will not be. "
He looked at the strip of birches with their motionless yellowness, greenery and white bark, glistening in the sun. "To die, so that they would kill me tomorrow, so that I would not be ... so that all this would be, but I would not be." He vividly imagined the absence of himself in this life. And these birches with their light and shadow, and these curly clouds, and this smoke of fires - everything around him was transformed and seemed to be something terrible and threatening. Frost ran down his back. Getting up quickly, he left the barn and began to walk.
Voices were heard from behind the barn.
- Who's there? - Prince Andrew called out.
The red-nosed captain Timokhin, the former company commander of Dolokhov, now, after the loss of officers, the battalion commander, timidly entered the barn. Behind him came the adjutant and the treasurer of the regiment.
Prince Andrey hastily got up, listened to what the officers had to convey to him in the service, gave them some more orders and was about to let them go when a familiar, whispering voice was heard from behind the shed.
- Que diable! [Damn it!] - said the voice of a man bumping against something.
Prince Andrew, looking out of the shed, saw Pierre approaching him, who stumbled on a lying pole and almost fell. Prince Andrew was generally unpleasant to see people from his world, especially Pierre, who reminded him of all those difficult moments that he experienced on his last visit to Moscow.
- That's how! - he said. - What are the fates? I didn’t wait.
While he was saying this, there was more than dryness in his eyes and the expression on his whole face — there was hostility, which Pierre immediately noticed. He approached the barn in the most animated state of mind, but seeing the expression on Prince Andrew's face, he felt embarrassed and awkward.
“I came… so… you know… I came… I'm interested,” said Pierre, who had already so many times that day meaninglessly repeated this word “interesting”. - I wanted to see the battle.
- Yes, yes, and what do the freemasons say about the war? How can you prevent it? - said Prince Andrey mockingly. - Well, what about Moscow? What are mine? Have you finally arrived in Moscow? He asked seriously.
- We've arrived. Julie Drubetskaya told me. I went to them and did not find them. They left for the Moscow region.

The officers wanted to take their leave, but Prince Andrey, as if not wanting to remain face to face with his friend, invited them to sit and drink tea. Benches and tea were served. The officers, not without surprise, looked at the fat, huge figure of Pierre and listened to his stories about Moscow and the disposition of our troops, which he had managed to drive around. Prince Andrey was silent, and his face was so unpleasant that Pierre turned to the good-natured battalion commander Timokhin than to Bolkonsky.
- So you understand the whole disposition of the troops? - Prince Andrey interrupted him.
- Yes, that is how? - said Pierre. - As a non-military person, I cannot say that completely, but I still understood the general disposition.
- Eh bien, vous etes plus avance que qui cela soit, [Well, you know more than anyone else.] - said Prince Andrew.
- A! - said Pierre with bewilderment, looking through his glasses at Prince Andrey. - Well, how do you say about the appointment of Kutuzov? - he said.
“I was very happy about this appointment, that's all I know,” said Prince Andrey.
- Well, tell me, what is your opinion about Barclay de Tolly? In Moscow, God knows what they said about him. How do you judge him?
“Just ask them,” said Prince Andrey, pointing to the officers.
Pierre, with a condescending questioning smile, with which everyone involuntarily turned to Timokhin, looked at him.
“They saw the light, your Excellency, as the Most Serene One did,” Timokhin said timidly and incessantly looking back at his regimental commander.
- Why is it so? Pierre asked.
- Yes, at least about firewood or feed, I will report to you. After all, we were retreating from Sventsian, don't you dare touch a twig, or a senz there, or something. After all, we are leaving, he gets it, isn't it, Your Excellency? - he turned to his prince, - don't you dare. In our regiment, two officers were put on trial for such cases. Well, as His Serene Highness did, it just became about it. They saw the light ...
- So why did he forbid?
Timokhin looked around in confusion, not understanding how and what to answer such a question. Pierre turned to Prince Andrew with the same question.
“And so as not to ruin the land that we left to the enemy,” said Prince Andrew, maliciously mockingly. - It's very basic; you must not allow the region to be plundered and the troops to be accustomed to looting. Well, in Smolensk, he also correctly judged that the French could bypass us and that they had more strength. But he could not understand that, - suddenly, as if in a thin voice that had escaped, Prince Andrey cried out, - but he could not understand that for the first time we fought there for the Russian land, that there was such a spirit in the troops that I had never seen before, that we fought off the French for two days in a row, and that this success multiplied our strength tenfold. He ordered to retreat, and all efforts and losses were wasted. He did not think about treason, he tried to do everything as best as possible, he thought it over; but from this it does not work. He is no good now precisely because he thinks everything over very thoroughly and carefully, as every German should. How can I tell you ... Well, your father has a German lackey, and he is an excellent lackey and will satisfy all his needs better than you, and let him serve; but if your father is sick at death, you will chase the lackey away and with your unfamiliar, clumsy hands will begin to follow your father and calm him down better than a skillful but stranger. And so they did with Barclay. As long as Russia was healthy, a stranger could serve her, and there was an excellent minister, but as soon as she was in danger; you need your own, dear person. And in your club they thought he was a traitor! By slandering him as a traitor, they will only do what, later, ashamed of their false reproach, they will suddenly turn the traitors into a hero or a genius, which will still be more unfair. He is an honest and very neat German ...
“However, they say he is a skillful commander,” said Pierre.
“I don’t understand what a skillful commander means,” said Prince Andrei with a sneer.
- A skillful commander, - said Pierre, - well, the one who foresaw all accidents ... well, he guessed the thoughts of the enemy.
“Yes, it’s impossible,” said Prince Andrey, as if about a case that had been decided long ago.
Pierre looked at him in surprise.
“However,” he said, “they say that war is like a chess game.
- Yes, - said Prince Andrey, - only with that small difference that in chess you can think as much as you like over every step, that you are out of the conditions of time, and with the difference that a knight is always stronger than a pawn and two pawns are always stronger one, and in war one battalion is sometimes stronger than a division, and sometimes weaker than a company. The relative strength of the troops is unknown to anyone. Believe me, ”he said,“ that if everything depended on the orders of the headquarters, then I would have been there and make orders, and instead I have the honor to serve here in the regiment with these gentlemen, and I think that it’s from us really tomorrow will depend, not on them ... Success has never depended and will not depend either on position, or on weapons, or even on numbers; and least of all from the position.
- And from what?
- From the feeling that is in me, in him, - he pointed to Timokhin, - in every soldier.
Prince Andrey glanced at Timokhin, who was looking at his commander with fear and bewilderment. Contrary to his former restrained silence, Prince Andrew now seemed agitated. He, apparently, could not refrain from expressing those thoughts that suddenly came to him.
- The battle will be won by the one who is determined to win it. Why did we lose the battle at Austerlitz? Our loss was almost equal to that of the French, but we told ourselves very early that we had lost the battle - and lost. And we said this because there was no need for us to fight there: we wanted to leave the battlefield as soon as possible. "If you lose - well run!" - we ran. If we hadn't said this until evening, God knows what would have happened. We won't say that tomorrow. You say: our position, the left flank is weak, the right flank is stretched, - he continued, - all this is nonsense, nothing of this. And what do we have to do tomorrow? One hundred million of the most varied accidents, which will be resolved instantly by the fact that they or ours ran or run, that they kill that one, they kill another; and what is being done now is all fun. The fact is that those with whom you traveled around the position not only do not contribute to the general course of affairs, but interfere with it. They are busy only with their own little interests.
- At such a moment? - Pierre said reproachfully.
“At such a moment,” repeated Prince Andrey, “for them this is only such a moment in which you can dig under the enemy and get an extra cross or ribbon. For me tomorrow is this: the 100,000-strong Russian and 100,000-strong French troops have come together to fight, and the fact is that these two hundred thousand are fighting, and whoever will fight angrily and feel less sorry for himself will win. And if you want, I'll tell you that no matter what, no matter what is confused up there, we will win the battle tomorrow. Tomorrow, whatever it is, we will win the battle!
“Here, your Excellency, it’s true, true,” said Timokhin. - Why feel sorry for yourself now! The soldiers in my battalion, believe me, did not drink vodka: not such a day, they say. - All were silent.
The officers got up. Prince Andrew went out with them behind the shed, giving the last orders to the adjutant. When the officers left, Pierre went up to Prince Andrew and was just about to start a conversation, when the hooves of three horses began to clatter along the road not far from the shed, and looking in this direction, Prince Andrew recognized Wolzogen and Clausewitz, accompanied by the Cossack. They drove close, continuing to talk, and Pierre and Andrei involuntarily heard the following phrases:
- Der Krieg muss im Raum verlegt werden. Der Ansicht kann ich nicht genug Preis geben, [War must be transferred to space. This view I cannot praise enough (in German)] - said one.
“O ja,” said another voice, “da der Zweck ist nur den Feind zu schwachen, so kann man gewiss nicht den Verlust der Privatpersonen in Achtung nehmen. [Oh yes, since the goal is to weaken the enemy, private losses cannot be taken into account (DE)]
- O ja, [Oh yes (German)] - confirmed the first voice.
- Yes, im Raum verlegen, [transfer to space (German)] - repeated, sniffing viciously, Prince Andrew, when they drove by. - Im Raum then [In space (German)] I have a father, and a son, and a sister in the Bald Mountains. It doesn't matter to him. This is what I told you - these gentlemen Germans will not win the battle tomorrow, but will only shit how much their strength will be, because in his German head there are only arguments that are not worth a damn, and in his heart there is nothing that only and you need for tomorrow - what is in Timokhin. They gave all of Europe to him and came to teach us - glorious teachers! His voice screamed again.
"So you think tomorrow's battle will be won?" - said Pierre.
“Yes, yes,” said Prince Andrei absentmindedly. “One thing I would do if I had power,” he began again, “I would not take prisoners. What are prisoners? This is chivalry. The French have destroyed my house and are going to destroy Moscow, and they have insulted and insulted me every second. They are my enemies, they are all criminals, according to my ideas. And Timokhin and the whole army think the same. We must execute them. If they are my enemies, they cannot be friends, no matter how they talk in Tilsit.
- Yes, yes, - said Pierre, looking at Prince Andrey with shining eyes, - I completely, completely agree with you!
The question that had worried Pierre from Mozhaiskaya Mountain all that day now seemed to him completely clear and completely resolved. He now understood the whole meaning and all the significance of this war and the forthcoming battle. Everything that he saw that day, all the significant, stern expressions that he caught a glimpse of, lit up for him with a new light. He understood that latente, as they say in physics, the warmth of patriotism, which was in all those people whom he saw, and which explained to him why all these people calmly and as if frivolously prepared for death.
“Don't take prisoners,” continued Prince Andrew. “That alone would change the whole war and make it less brutal. And then we played war - that's bad, we are magnanimous and the like. This magnanimity and sensitivity - like the generosity and sensitivity of a lady, with whom she becomes sick when she sees a calf being killed; she is so kind that she cannot see the blood, but she eats this calf with gusto with sauce. They talk to us about the rights of war, about chivalry, about parliamentarianship, to spare the unfortunate, and so on. All nonsense. In 1805, I saw chivalry, parliamentarianship: we were cheated, we were cheated. They rob other people's houses, send fake banknotes, and worst of all, they kill my children, my father and talk about the rules of war and generosity to enemies. Do not take prisoners, but kill and go to death! Who came to this as I did, with the same suffering ...
Prince Andrew, thinking that he did not care whether or not they took Moscow as they took Smolensk, suddenly stopped in his speech from an unexpected convulsion that seized him by the throat. He walked several times in silence, but his eyes glittered feverishly, and his lip trembled when he began to speak again:
- If there was no generosity in the war, then we would go only when it is worth going to certain death, as now. Then there would be no war for the fact that Pavel Ivanovich offended Mikhail Ivanovich. And if the war is like now, so is the war. And then the intensity of the troops would not be the same as it is now. Then all these Westphalians and Hessians, led by Napoleon, would not have followed him to Russia, and we would not have gone to fight in Austria and Prussia, without knowing why. War is not a courtesy, but the most disgusting thing in life, and one must understand this and not play war. This terrible necessity must be taken strictly and seriously. This is all: throw away the lie, and war is so war, not a toy. And then war is the favorite pastime of idle and frivolous people ... The military class is the most honorable. And what is war, what is needed for success in military affairs, what are the customs of a military society? The purpose of the war is murder, the weapons of war are espionage, treason and its encouragement, ruining the inhabitants, robbing them or stealing for the food of the army; deception and lies called military tricks; the morals of the military class - the lack of freedom, that is, discipline, idleness, ignorance, cruelty, debauchery, drunkenness. And despite the fact - this is the upper class, revered by all. All the kings, except for the Chinese, wear a military uniform, and the one who killed the people more is given a great reward ... They will converge, like tomorrow, to kill each other, they will interrupt, torture tens of thousands of people, and then they will serve thanksgiving prayers for having beaten many people (of which the number is still being added), and they proclaim victory, believing that the more people are beaten, the greater the merit. How God looks from there and listens to them! - Prince Andrey shouted in a thin, squeaky voice. - Oh, my soul, lately it has become hard for me to live. I see that I have begun to understand too much. And it is not good for a person to partake of the tree of knowledge of good and evil ... Well, but not for long! He added. “However, you are asleep, and a pen for me, go to Gorki,” Prince Andrey suddenly said.

The Pyramid of Cheops (Egyptian Achet-Chufu) is a monument from the Seven Wonders of the World, which, according to Wikipedia, remains indestructible to this day. The pyramid belongs to the Giza plateau, including and.

Where is

The pyramid of Cheops, Egypt, is located in the province, 30 km from Cairo, in the historic town of Giza, along El-Haram street. The address includes only the name of the district and the street, since Al-Haram is a whole area of ​​burial tombs and historical monuments. On the map, the tomb of Cheops is adjacent to the Great Sphinx and two smaller pyramids - Hevren and Menkaur.

How to get there

There are several ways to get to the Giza plateau and the Cheops pyramid. If you are resting in the district of Hurghada or Sharm el-Sheikh, the most in a simple way will take a sightseeing bus from almost every hotel. You can get there on your own.

From anywhere in Egypt need to go to Cairo... The most convenient way to do this is by buses, the schedule of which will allow you not to stay overnight in Giza, but to have time to see the sights one day. Arriving in Cairo, take the metro and continue to Giza station, then change to bus number 900 or number 997. This shuttle bus will take you to Al Haram in 15 minutes. You will have to walk to the pyramid. This path is laid through no less interesting sights, so you will pass 2 km without noticing fatigue.

Origin story

The history of the creation of the pharaoh's pyramid to this day remains shrouded in secrets and mysteries. Earlier it was believed that the construction of the Cheopsazan pyramid took about 20 years by the ancient Egyptians, however, modern scientists give a different conclusion. Having studied rock painting and records preserved from the time of the pharaoh, the researchers state that the pharaoh ruled in Ancient egypt about 50 years, of which at least 40 lasted for the construction of the tomb. Thus, when asked how many years the pyramid has existed, scientists give approximately 4 thousand years.

It is known that the architect was the nephew of the ruler, Hemion, who worked for a long time on the creation of the project and drawing, relying on strong mathematical knowledge. Thoroughness and scrupulousness reflected in the unimaginable durability of the building, thus leading to a dead end all the scientists of our time.

Appearance

The pyramid was erected on a limestone rock, the foot of the building was framed by a low pulpit, which has not survived since those times. Limestone blocks were used as a material, which were amenable to grinding. After that, the pyramid was faced twice. The weight of the middle block reached 2.5 tons, the erected blocks were pulled from the Nile with the help of a dozen ropes, after which the most laborious part of the work began - lifting the block to the foundation. There are theories that the lifting was also carried out with the help of ropes and at an angle laid out from wooden beams. During the attack on Cairo by the Arabs in the XII century, modern capital was burned to the ground. Then the Egyptians began to remove the cladding for the construction and restoration of their homes.

Statistical data

The height of the Cheopsan pyramid today is 139 meters away... According to some reports, the pyramid was originally 2 meters higher, such a difference in meters appeared due to the gradual subsidence of the foundation into the sand.

The dimensions of the Cheops pyramid in meters: perimeter - 922 m, area - 5.3 hectares, the length of the lateral rib - 930 m. It exceeds 4 million tons, and the volume is 2.58 million m³.

Concavity of the sides

If you watch the pyramid for more than one hour, then you can see how, in the light of the sun, the unevenness of the sides of the pyramid appears. This discovery was made in the 18th century to the present day. remains a secret of the Cheops pyramid... Scientist S. Edwards claims that the pyramid acquired such a disproportionate appearance over time, gradually sinking into the sand.

Tilt angle

The geometry of the pharaoh's tomb is a complex enigma, the answer to which cannot be unambiguous. One of such questions is the angle of inclination of the Cheops pyramid. With approximate data on the length and height of the sides, a whole galaxy of scientists from all over the world have concluded that the angle exceeds 51 degrees. An interesting question remains about the existence of the theory of the "Golden Section" at this time. Since the value for sekeda (Egyptian unit of measurement) was chosen a number close in value to pi. Another mystery of geometry the location of the corridors and passages remains, which, according to Egyptologists, give reasons for the name of the pyramid an astronomical observatory.

Internal structure

Now the entrance to the pyramid is in the north of the building in the form of an arch made of stone slabs. Tourists climb a 17-meter corridor built in 820 to see what is inside the Cheops pyramid. It is known that the original entrance has not survived, as it was closed in antiquity with a stone slab. What is the reason for the transfer of the entrance remains unknown. The internal structure of the Cheops pyramid includes 3 burial chambers, which are located one above the other.

Burial "pit"

In his writings, Herodotus described in detail the pyramid built during his lifetime. According to him, the 105 meter long corridor leading to the base of the building is the road to the cell in which the body of the deceased pharaoh Cheops... Thus, engineers in the 19th century cleared a passage underground. But the sarcophagus was not there, and the scientists concluded that the chamber remained completely unfinished. From this, a theory was deduced according to which the chamber for the ruler really should have been placed at the bottom of the foundation, but in the end result, it was moved to the center.

The Ascending Corridor and the Queen's Chambers

At 18 meters from the entrance there is a corridor with an approximate height of 40 meters, which leads to the Great Gallery. At the beginning of this corridor there are three "plugs" made of granite, which block the passage to further corners of the construction. Previously it was believed that no rooms, except for the descending corridor, were built in the pyramid. However, Al-Mamun was able to pave a way around these "traffic jams". It was believed that they served as an obstacle to entering the King's chamber. The ascending corridor has a mysterious design - the square corridor is pierced with "frame stones", with small niches in the wall.

A 35 m horizontal corridor leads to the 2nd chamber of the Great Gallery. The walls here are made of huge blocks, on which false seams are marked, giving the impression that the size of the blocks is half the size. This cell was called the "Queen's Chamber". It is faced with the same limestone and includes a high niche on one of the walls.

Grotto, Great Gallery and Pharaoh's Chambers

There is another passage from the Great Gallery - a vertical shaft 60 meters high. It is believed that her purpose was an evacuation exit for workers who were completing work on "The Tsar's Chamber." In the middle of the room there is a "Grotto" intended for several people. The walls here are made of stone, and the shaft was already laid in the existing structure.

The King's Chamber has two 17-meter-long discharge cavities above it, which were supposedly formed in order to distribute the pressure of the blocks over the King's chamber. The weight of the limestone blocks above the chamber reaches 1 million tons.

Ventilation ducts

The "King's Chamber" and "Queen's Chamber" each have two ventilation outlets, which have a through-shaped construction. There are many versions about their purpose, but the most famous is the version of the afterlife movement of souls, according to which the soul of the deceased King rises along the channel.

Research history

A detailed study of the Cheops pyramid began back in the 19th century by a group of Egyptologists who, from studying the external proportions and location of the pyramid, moved on to unraveling the secrets of the internal structure.

Recent research

Scientists, puzzled by the question of the perfect fit of the blocks in size, put forward the theory that the formation of limestone was carried out right on the spot, without stopping the construction of the pyramid. Only this fact can explain the coincidence of all mathematical calculations.

Diagram of the Cheops pyramid

Pyramid of Cheops is considered one of the most mysterious on the Giza plateau. Interesting Facts, legends and speculations attract hundreds of thousands of tourists every year.

• The area of ​​the pyramid is equal to the area of ​​10 football fields;
• The construction took about 2.2 million blocks;
• The usual understanding that the pyramid is the tomb of the King has been refuted by scientists, who say that the pyramid was never used as a tomb and had a different purpose;
• There are also theories that the pyramid is a special calendar. The thoroughness of the construction led to the fact that orientation in space along the pyramid will be more accurate than according to the usual compass.

Video

After lengthy research, scientists have not found a solution to the mystery of the Cheops pyramid, but the process of excavation and study of details does not stop, maintaining the hope that someday people will still be able to understand the mysteries of the pyramid.

What to see nearby

The Pyramid of Cheops is not the only attraction in the area. Arriving on an excursion, you can get acquainted with other equally interesting buildings.

• Pharaoh's boats- 7 real boats were discovered during excavations near the pyramid. They are made from a single piece of cedar and have no fastener marks or nails. After the reconstruction, the dimensions of the boats were established, the length of which is about 43 meters, the width is 6 meters. There is a museum next to the pyramid, which houses all the samples.
• Pyramids of Queens of Cheops- in the east of the pyramid of Pharaoh Cheops, there are 3 pyramids of a much smaller size. They were intended for the wives, the Queens of the Pharaoh. The first - Queen Meritites I - is currently almost erased from the ground, as 2/3 of its buildings have sunk into the sand. Here is also the tomb of the mother of the pharaoh - Hetepheres I, who died during the reign of Cheops.
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